Salvation
by Candyspell
Summary: After the events which transpired in the Golden Army, Prince Nuada is resurrected by mysterious forces to defeat an unknown evil. With the help of a young woman who is more than she seems, Nuada is given a chance at redemption and a lesson in acceptance.
1. Catalyst

Prince Nuada's ashes scattered themselves in the wind. Particles of gold dust floated and swirled at the air's ministrations and what should have been the end, was only just the beginning. For in that fateful moment when one ancient chapter began to close, elsewhere in the world, there were other things at work and something evil stirred beneath the small town of Willow's Den, Maine.

* * *

Beth wasn't particularly keen on the fact that she had to bike almost thirty minutes to town every day just to get to work, but living off the land was cheap and she didn't have the money to throw down on even the most modest of hovels at the center of town. So as she rode into town that grey morning in October, she reminded herself of her situation and decided that instead of moping about her lack of vehicle and her lack of money, she would simply admire the thick orange and gold foliage that lined the winding road to town. The pavement was damp from the rainfall the evening before and though the sky was grey now, she was confident that she wouldn't have to worry about the rain other than the puddles on the road that caused an occasional spray of water to kick up from the wheels of her bicycle.

Jeez. She was going to be late again and soaked. Not that anyone would care if the diner she worked at opened a bit later than usual. Her boss rarely checked in and when he did, it was always around close when he was on his way to the local watering hole. She'd been waitressing at Joe's since she was sixteen and while the tips were shit, it was enough to add to her meagre savings; the one hope she had of escaping Willow's Den forever and she'd been saving for years.

She turned her bike off the main road, which connected her small cabin-like home to the rest of town, and headed for a worn down path that lead into the forest. The terrain was rougher there, but it was also quicker and while she did like to go biking through the forest on occasion, she really was worried about the state of the sky and questioned whether it wouldn't just open up on her right then and there and pour down atop her mess of brown curly hair. Humidity was the last thing she needed.

As she biked along the path, something shiny caught her eye, so with a bit of hesitation, and the secret hope that whatever she'd just driven past was something highly valuable and, therefore, pawnable, she stopped pedaling and hopped off her trusty bike and leaned it up against a tree. She narrowed her eyes and squinted, bending down a bit as she scanned the leafy area surrounding the path. She spotted it a few feet from where she'd stopped and peered down to find a tarnished gold chain. She leaned forward to pick it up, only to find that it was much longer than she had initially believed it to be. She pulled it up from the ground and kept pulling, feeling sort of like the clown she'd had on her fifth birthday who had pulled yards and yards of colorful cloths out of his sleeve. It appeared to be attached to something, for as she pulled, the chain suddenly went taught and she was forced to brush aside the leaves and peer under them to see what had hindered her from tugging the chain free. Her hands brushed at the leaves and dirt impatiently until suddenly, a hand shot out from the moist earth and latched onto her wrist. She instantly dropped the chain and let out a shriek trying to pull her hand free, though hard as she tried, the fingers remained closed tightly around her wrist and the more she pulled, the more she tugged loose from the ground the arm that the hand was attached to. Finally, the hand let her go and then, something... no... someone, started to rise out of the ground. She dropped the chain and watched as it whipped away from her, wrapping itself around the white arm which had started to claw viciously, desperately at the dirt. It swiped at the ground for awhile and as Beth turned to run screaming for town, she noticed that it seemed to be stuck and that whoever owned it was trapped under mounds of earth.

"Holy fuck," she muttered, edging a little closer. What if whoever was down there was dying? Could she really just leave whoever was struggling down there and let them die? She resolved that she could not and began madly shoveling dirt out of the way.

"It's okay! It's gonna be okay... shit... I've got you!" As she uncovered the earth, she grabbed the hand and felt it wrap itself around her smaller one, gripping tightly as she made to haul whoever was buried beneath the soil out. She used all her strength and grit her teeth, pulling and scrambling in the fallen leaves, and then, with a cry of surprise, she unearthed, of all things, a man. Or at least that's what she thought he was. Though his skin was impossibly white, like smooth marble, and despite the dirt which clung to his long platinum colored hair, she could make out a strong jawline, golden eyes, and dark lips and eyelids.

The man spluttered and coughed as Beth hauled him out of his shallow grave. He hauled himself free of the hole and she lost her balance, letting go of his arm and falling onto her backside. She watched on with wide eyes as the man-thing lay on his front for a long time, breathing heavily, gasping, and choking up dirt. He was, Beth noted with a hot flush in her cheeks, completely naked save for the golden chains circling his wrists. The chains had a prehensile quality to them, and seemed to shift and settle continuous along his arms until they came to rest in the form of strange wristbands around his thick wrists. Beth waited a moment until she realized that he'd gone unconscious, during which she took the liberty of turning him over and brushing the mud and hair back off his forehead before scrambling backwards and peering at him from a safer distance.. She gasped when she looked into his face, for that was not the face of a human, and yet, she recognized an air of power, something strong and yet something fragile. As she watched his chest rise and fall, she crawled on all fours to get a better look at him, curiosity outweighing her sense that told her she should have been running back to town as quickly as she possibly could. His eyes fluttered and she gasped when they opened, their gold irises staring hazily through her, trying to focus and failing. In those eyes were unimaginable sadness, fierceness, pride, and fear. They were beautiful, like crystalized amber.

"Where... filthy... mortal..." And with those eloquent words, his eyes closed again and, save for the rise and fall of his chest, he did not move.

"Fucking elves," Beth muttered angrily.


	2. Once a King

_"Is this a dream?" Nuada looked all around him. At the swaying golden grasses surrounding him, the backs of his pale hands, the amber color of the sky._

_"Only if you think on it," a lilting, feminine voice responded from behind him._

_Nuada turned his head slowly to see his sister standing there as she always had been; with her quiet and worried smiles and her wide, beautiful eyes staring at him as though he were troubling her. He hated her eyes and yet he had been longing to see them. He brought his sister into an embrace and felt her warmth against him. Surely, this was no dream._

_"Are we dead?" Nuada asked._

_He pulled away and looked down to his sister, but she smiled, if not with traces of a heavy heart. "I am. Happily, so. I have lived far too long."_

_"I want to be with you. I'm sorry. Nuala... I don't... I'm so sorry. For everything."_

_He felt her gentle hand against his cheek, smoothing away his sorrow, his anguish. His ambition, his skewed perception of what was right, had cost them both their lives. Power had driven him mad and he would have died gladly for it. This place... This was anguish. This space of in-between. The rolling plains stretched on and on around them, showing no end in sight. There was nothing here. Only the rolling sway of the tall grasses and the beating warmth of the orange sun._

_"This is the last time I'll ever see you, brother. I have lived so much and you... you have lived so little. This is your chance at a wonderful life. To repent for all you have done. I know you are capable of such good. I know it because I have seen it and I forgive you for losing your way. For in these uncertain times," and at this she gave pause and giggled one final time, "it's only natural to feel uncertain." She leaned up and kissed his cheek, drying a stray tear as she began to back away. He held onto her hand reluctantly, yet still she pulled away and he was forced to let go. Nuala smiled, tossing a glance back over her shoulder at him. "And don't be too much of a bother to that girl. You may be royalty, but she's not your servant!"_

_Nuada suddenly felt dizzy and try as he might to move forward, to give chase to his beautiful sister, he had lost control of his legs. His world began to grow dark, the golden plains swirling with the blankness of unconsciousness._

Nuada awoke in a modest looking bedroom, covered in a sheen of sweat. His whole body ached and he felt nauseous, sort of like he'd been spinning for hours on end. Where was he? He wasn't familiar with human houses. Their decore was modest, practically non-existence, and their drapery... But before he could belittle his resting chambers further, he spotted a girl asleep in a chair at the side of the bed. Her long brown hair was damp, the color of copper, and her honey-colored skin was dappled with tiny freckles across her nose. She was pleasantly built and his eyes wandered along the smooth contours of her neck down to her chest, which, in her slumber, had become exposed to the point where modesty made him turn his head back into the pillow with a slight roll of his eyes. _This_ was his rescuer? If he hadn't been there when she'd pulled him out of the earth, he might not have believed it. His prejudice for humans resonated deeply within his thoughts. He was mildly impressed that someone so pitiful could have saved him. Grateful might have been a stretch, but he was certainly surprised. Humans so rarely surprised him that even the concept of her doing exactly that confounded him further.

How he had gotten into that situation in the first place, he could not recall. One minute he'd been dying... No. He'd been dead... Then suddenly, he'd been healed, alive and well, only to feel the ground suffocating him from above. He couldn't make sense of it, especially not with the voices of the dead still swimming through his mind. He eyed a glass of water at the bedside and took the small, plastic cup in his hand. He propped himself up onto his elbows and drank deeply, feeling droplets of water dribble down his chin.

"Thirsty?" A voice asked dryly.

He reached for a blade that he no longer had, frightened by the unexpected and sleepy voice of his rescuer. He narrowed his eyes and wiped at his mouth with the back of his hand, tossing the cup to her. She flailed as it flew towards her, knocking it on the ground where it bounced against the grey carpet. "Fill it, mortal. And fetch me some robes!"

The strange girl stood, enraged, and balled her small hands into even tinier, unimpressive fists. "What the hell! Who do you think you are, elf boy?! God. I've read about elves since I was a kid, but you know what?! You're worse than anything those damn stories could have prepared me for!"

He frowned, not used to someone flaring up in such a fashion before him. Usually, they cowered in fear. This one stood defiantly, towering over him as she approached the bedside and wildly gestured her arms around as though she might have been about to smack him aside the head. Humans were such odd creatures... But if she were human, how did she know of elves?

"What book?" he asked in genuine interest, pausing her mid-rant. "I'm too weak to move. Bring it here. I should like something to read until I am recovered." The request seemed perfectly viable to him and yet, this only seemed to anger her even more. She began to yell rather strange obscenities that were foreign to his ears. He wasn't entirely clear of human vernacular and slang, but he was certain these were curse words in human-speak.

"Who the hell are you?! Why were you buried in the ground? And make it good! I missed work to carry your broke ass home on my bike. Do you know how hard it was to drag you here?!" He sized her up once more and deducted that it was physically impossible that she should have carried him here all on her own. She was no taller than a sprite or pixie. He was a tall man. Almost, twice her weight too and that was without his armor, which he noted also wasn't anywhere in the room.

"I am Prince Nuada." He hesitated and frowned. "I suppose I am King now..." His world had unraveled. He didn't know where he was. He didn't understand how he was here.

"King? Of what? That hole in the ground that I pulled you out of?" The human's temper seemed temporarily quieted for the time being, though now his temper was the one that had been tweaked. He glared up at her and threw the quilt off of himself, forcing himself to his feet so that he could tower over her in his usual imposing fashion.

"How dare you speak to me in such a tone! Do you not know who I am?" He sneered down at her, his muscles screaming in protest, yet his pride kept his feet shakily planted on the floor beneath him.

She backed away almost as quickly as he had stood and her bright green eyes darted from his eyes to his waist and then away. Her cheeks turned a violent shade of red and she put a hand up to shield her eyes. From what, he hadn't the slightest idea.

"Uh... No. Honestly, dude, I have no idea who you are. Jesus... Put some fucking clothes on, alright? There should be something in the drawers that fit. I'll be in the kitchen when you're ready to talk," she said, suppressing a small smile. She edged her way around him and then slid out the door, closing in gently behind her. Confused once again, he glanced downwards and rolled his eyes. Humans were so bloody squeamish. He staggered over towards the dresser she had pointed to and began rifling through its contents until he found a pair of odd breeches that he thought might fit. He tugged them on, finding them surprisingly snug and difficult to maneuver. Eventually, he managed to shimmy them up over his hips and that's when he caught a glance of himself in the mirror hanging above the dresser. His long hair was damp and clean. In fact, his whole body was clean... Had she taken it upon herself to clean him? He wondered. There were bandages thickly wrapped around his chest and as he peeled them back, he caught sight of a strange black marking that seemed to have been branded over his heart. It was hot to touch and painful. He resealed the bandages and scanned the room once more for his armor, for his weapons; anything that was his. He found nothing so he crept his way out of the bedroom, down the hallway, and hit his head against the doorframe entering the kitchen. The wench laughed at him from where she leaned against a table and he shot her a black look whilst he rubbed his forehead. It had already ached before, now it throbbed.

Disoriented, he looked to her pleadingly and asked, "Where am I?"

She sized him up, looking at him from head to toe before responding, "Welcome to Willow's Den. It's in Maine? Uh, U.S.A.? North America... Any of these places ring a bell?" she asked. He nodded dismissively. He was well-acquainted with human geography.

"Did you bring me back?" he asked.

"No. Someone did though. That's what that mark on your chest is. Look, I can't get messed up in this stuff. So with all due respect, when you're ready to go, just go. Magic like that is no small parlor trick and I'd reckon whoever marked you will probably be looking for you," she replied.

He considered her words carefully. There were too many pieces, too many unanswered questions. He was a highly intelligent creature, but this was a bit much even for him. He didn't see the patterns, nor the threads that looped everything together.

"Human-"

"Stop calling me human! I'm not human... Not entirely," she interjected. "I'm half-dryad, asshole."

"Lovely," he snorted. He massaged his temples and peered up at her from the swath of hair covering his eyes. "A mongrel." So this was his hell? That he should be tormented by odd visions while he slept and an irritating half-dryad when he awoke. He decided that he preferred the silence of death.


End file.
